英國人的英語最難懂:母語人士請學會說通用英語

If native speakers of English are not to become internationAl corporate pariahs, they will need to learn how to speak global English – in other words, to communicate with non-native speakers.

如果英語母語人士不想被國際商業界所遺棄，他們需要去學習如何講通用英語——換言之，就是和非母語人士溝通。

Resentment at the complexity of native speakers' English is widespread in international business. During a study carried out at Kone Elevators of Finland, one Finnish manager blurted out: “The British are the worst . . . It is much more difficult to understand their English than that of other nationalities. When we non-native speakers of English talk, it is much easier to understand. We have the same limited vocabulary.”

在國際商界，針對母語人士英語複雜性的不滿普遍存在。在芬蘭通力電梯進行的一項調查中，一位芬蘭經理人脫口而出：“英國人最差勁了……他們講的英語是所有國家中最難懂的。而我們這些非英語母語人士所說的話，要容易理解得多。我們都擁有同樣有限的詞彙量。”

How can native speakers of English make themselves more comprehensible and more likeable? The most obvious way is to learn someone else's language. The great benefit of learning other languages is that you have some idea of what non-native speakers are up against. However, news this week that fewer than half of English schoolchildren are learning a foreign language suggests that this is not going to be a profitable route for many.

英語母語人士怎樣才能使自己更容易爲人理解和喜愛呢？最明顯的方法，就是學習其他人的語言。學習其它語言的一大好處就是你可以對其它非母語人士的問題有所瞭解。然而，有消息稱，只有不到半數的英國學童在學習一門外語，說明對很多人來說，以上建議並不是好方法。

So what should native English-speakers do to make themselves better understood? First, slow down, but not to the point where members of your audience think you are patronising them. Second, avoid idiomatic and metaphorical expressions: that's the way the cookie crumbles, people in glass houses, and the like.

那麼英語母語人士應該怎樣做，使自己能夠更好地被別人所理解呢？首先，放慢語速，但是不要慢到使你的聽衆覺得你是在遷就他們。第二，避免使用成語和比喻的表達方式：例如“餅乾就是那麼碎的”（that's the way the cookie crumbles，意指無可避免）、“玻璃屋中人”（people in glass houses，意指自身有問題和身處險境的人）等表達方式。

Jokes are a difficult area. You will not forget the silence that follows one that is found baffling. On the other hand, when jokes work, they can be a huge success with a non-native speaking audience. If you have learnt other languages, you will know that very few achievements are as satisfying as understanding your first foreign joke. Try a few out with your non-native speaking audience; you will soon learn which ones are worth repeating.

笑話是一個很難理解的領域。一個讓人難以理解的笑話會帶來一片沉默，這會使你難以忘懷。而另一方面，當笑話起作用時，它們會爲你在英語非母語人中帶來巨大的成功。如果你學過其它語言，你會知道，聽懂自己的第一個外國笑話，會帶來一種無可比擬的成就感。試着給非母語聽衆講幾個笑話後，你會很快明白哪些是值得重複的。

It is often unnecessary to avoid longer words such as “association” and “nationality”, which are common to the Romance languages and will be widely understood in Europe and Latin America.

通常沒有必要去避免較長的單詞，例如“association”（協會、聯合） 和 “nationality”（國家、民族），這些詞在拉丁語系中很常見，在歐洲和拉丁美洲都能被廣泛理解。

Listen to verbal responses for signs of whether you have been understood or not. Make sure your non-native speaking colleagues have the chance to talk; they will often be paraphrasing your words in an attempt to satisfy themselves that they have grasped what you said.

從人們的反應中找尋自己是否被人理解的跡象。讓非母語同事有機會說話，他們常常會重複你說過的話，以此肯定自己已經理解了你表達的意思。

Always remember that the greatest friend of the non-native speaker is repetition. Find more than one way of getting your point across and summarise frequently.

切記，非英語母語人士最好的朋友就是重複。不要只用一種說法來表達自己的意思，同時要經常進行總結。